Copyright Alexander Kluge.
Storm Sabine aside, it’s starting to feel a little more like spring, which means it’s time to take the leap outdoors and experience all that the city has to offer. From film festivals galore to a bumper-to-bumper lineup of exhibitions, have your calendars at the ready.
January-29-March 01
The Eternal Network—Haus der Kulturen der Welt
Transmediale 2020 | © The Laboratory of Manuel Bürger. Courtesy of Haus der Kulturen der Welt.
Despite how you may feel about your subpar phone coverage, networks never die. That is according to curator of The Eternal Network, Kristoffer Gansing who has created this group exhibition to question human potentials and limits in light of the current social and technological landscape.
February 01
Las Casas Invisibles—Funkhaus Berlin
Puerto Rican choreographer Kiani Del Valle’s stages a one-night only electric dance show with a ten-piece troupe and backed with live music from Floating Points, Raven and Lotic.
February 05
Yalda Afsah—Berlinische Galerie
Berlin artist Yalda Afsah is screening two short films in the IBB Video Space at the Berlinische Galerie. Both films are shot in the little French town of Quissac—Tourneur documents the tradition of bullfighting in region whilst Vidourle shows a community scene of boys in a river proving their courage to each other.
Photo: Laura Schaeffer.
February 06-09
Final Girls Berlin Film Festival—City Kino Wedding
Final Girls Berlin puts a spotlight on horror movies specifically made by women and non-binary filmmakers. The festival wants to offer a more varied representation of women in horror flicks beyond being “beautified victims” and “constructions of male fantasies or anxieties”.
February 07
Duna Bianca—Dittrich & Schlechtriem
The exhibition focuses on a cross-generational selection of Swiss artists contributing a variety of artistic offerings, from pop-art to painting with works by the likes of Sylvie Fleury, Stephane Kropf, and Miriam Laura Leonardi.
Six Songs, Swirling Gracefully In The Taut Air—Gropius Bau
Akinbode Akinbiyi, Bar Beach, Victoria Island, Lagos, 2006. From the series Sea Never Dry Photography. Courtesy: the artist.
Berlin-based, Nigerian photographer Akinbode Akinbiyi presents a long-term photo series on display at the Gropius Bau capturing candid moments in the tight-knit communities of Lagos, Berlin, Johannesburg, Bamako and Chicago.
In My Room—Maxim Gorki Theatre
“Men appear to be stuck in old patterns, prisoners in the system of male dominance. What does it mean to be a man in the year 2020?” Falk Richter’s research project In My Room exploring the modern state of masculinity with snapshot scenes of sons remembering their fathers, family rituals, quotidien encounters and watershed social moments through theatre. A piece of theatre that “dives into the unexplored black boxes that fathers leave behind.”
February 08
Squish—Efremidis Gallery
Featuring the work of Carlotta Bailly-Borg, Christiane Blattmann, Lindsay Lawson, Teresa Solar, and Jens Kothe, Squish explores notions of ambiguity and desire across multi-disciplinary art.
Jenny Hval courtesy of HAU
February 11
Das Theater der Kinos — Volksbühne Berlin
Theatre of Cinemas is a multi-media exhibition unfolding on two floors of the Volksbühne with cinema works by the likes of Chantal Akerman, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Thomas Heise, Tilda Swinton, and Jean-Luc Godard.
February 14
Jenny Hval: The Practice of Love—Hebbel am Ufer
Norwegian musician, composer and writer Jenny Hval explores sonic, visual and choreographic ideas while transforming voices, sounds and bodies into texts in a technique that she describes as a form of magic.
February 20
Berlinale—Various venues
This year is the 70th anniversary of the Berlinale—Berlin’s International Film Festival, conceived with the intention of being a “showcase of the free world ”. This year, 400 films are set to be screened in different locations across Berlin.
Hassan Sharif, 1981, Courtesy Hassan Sharif Estate
February 23 TAME w/ Crystallmess, Gabber Eleganza, Samuel Kerridge & more—Trauma Bar and Kino
In the newly created environment QT UR EA, Gabber Eleganza brings his post rave aesthetic, set to be joined by genre-dfying Crystallmess from Paris and Samuel Kerridge.
February 29
Hassan Sharif: I am the single work artist—KW Institute
Emirati conceptual artist Hassan Sharif first major European retrospective opens at the KW Institute as the month comes to a close, including works from the late ‘70s to 2016. Sharif championed an experimental artistic approach, which investigated the role that colour plays in art, the artistic potential of the mundane household object and playing with semi-spaces.